I came across a very illuminating study titled \u201cPhysician Recommendations Trump Patient Preferences in Prostate Cancer Decisions.\u201d The researchers polled 257 newly diagnosed low-to-intermediate risk PCa patients after diagnosis but before their next urology consultation. The patients answered questions about their preferences in the following areas:<\/p>\n
The study\u2019s authors used these factors as well as physician treatment recommendation to analyze which might be predictive of treatment choice. On top of that, they recorded the doctors\u2019 clinical encounters with the patients prior to the patients making a decision in order to learn if the doctors discussed patients\u2019 interest in sex. Then, the patients were followed until they eventually decided to have a treatment or go on active surveillance<\/a>. Their choices were correlated with all factors and analyzed.<\/p>\n What do you think the authors found? Doctor recommendations, not patient preferences, primarily predicted the choice of treatment vs. surveillance. Not surprisingly, the recommendations were based on clinical factors (age and Gleason score<\/a>). Sadly, physician suggestions were largely disconnected from patients\u2019 \u201cpersonal views of the relative pros and cons of treatment alternatives.\u201d<\/p>\n Based on the taped clinical consultation, the authors concluded, \u201cUrologists rarely discussed patients\u2019 interest in sex (<15% of appointments).\u201d<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n This situation, documented by research, is worlds apart from our own experience. Granted, patients who come to us for multiparametric MRI <\/a>and focal laser ablation (FLA)<\/a> are not representative of all prostate cancer patients. They aren\u2019t waiting for a doctor to bring up treatment-related sexual side effects because sexuality is already a factor in their treatment decision. They come to us because their desire to maintain sexual quality of life led them to seek an alternative outside of the conventional whole gland options, surgery and radiation. They also prefer immediate \u2013 and likely durable \u2013 tumor control over active surveillance with its uncertainty.<\/p>\n Even with all these up front preferences, we still discuss and evaluate their baseline sexual function. It\u2019s an essential part of the conversation as we work with each patient\u2019s treatment plan. For men who are qualified candidates for FLA, we (and they) have an extremely high degree of confidence that our real-time MRI guided treatment will preserve their potency. So let\u2019s talk about maintaining sexual function after treatment. It\u2019s part of the discussion, it\u2019s part of the planning, and it\u2019s part of the results.<\/p>\n Copyright by Dan Sperling, MD. Reprint permission courtesy of Sperling Prostate Center<\/a> (New York, Florida), the leading U.S. center for multiparametric detection, diagnosis and image-guided focal treatment of prostate cancer.<\/em><\/p>\n Read more in our\u00a0Prostate Cancer Health\u00a0Center<\/a>.<\/p>\n Scherr KA et al. Physician recommendations trump patient preferences in prostate cancer decisions. Medical Decision Making<\/em><\/a> 2017 Jan;37(1):56-69.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I came across a very illuminating study titled \u201cPhysician Recommendations Trump Patient Preferences in Prostate Cancer Decisions.\u201d The researchers polled 257 newly diagnosed low-to-intermediate risk … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":63473,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[3],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/red64.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67380"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/red64.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/red64.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/red64.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/red64.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=67380"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/red64.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67380\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/red64.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/63473"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/red64.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=67380"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/red64.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=67380"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/red64.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=67380"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Reference<\/h3>\n